Posted on 12/02/2004 9:14:19 AM PST by Darnright
LONDON (Reuters) - Nearly half of Britons in a poll said they had never heard of Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp in southern Poland that became a symbol of the Holocaust and the attempted genocide of the Jews.
The results of the survey conducted by the BBC were released on Thursday as Britain's public broadcaster announced it will show a new series next January to mark the 60th anniversary of the concentration camp's liberation.
"We were amazed by the results of our audience research," said Laurence Rees, a producer on the series, "Auschwitz: The Nazis & the 'Final Solution."'
"It's easy to presume that the horrors of Auschwitz are engrained in the nation's collective memory, but obviously this is not the case," Rees said.
The survey found that 45 percent of those surveyed had not heard of Auschwitz. Historians estimate that anywhere from one million to three million people, about 90 percent of them Jews, were killed there.
Among women and people younger than 35, 60 percent had never heard of Auschwitz, despite the recent popularity of films such as "Schindler's List," "Life is Beautiful" and "The Pianist," which depict the atrocities of the Holocaust.
"The name Auschwitz is quite rightly a byword for horror, but the problem with thinking about horror is that we naturally turn away from it," Rees said.
The BBC said the research was based on a nationally representative postal survey of 4,000 adults 16 and older.
The broadcaster is marking Holocaust Memorial Day, January 27, with a variety of television and radio programs.
The Auschwitz series for BBC2 is based on nearly 100 interviews with survivors and perpetrators and is the result of three years of research with the assistance of professors Ian Kershaw and David Cesarani.
Another reason why the left is so committed to dumbing down our young people. History disproves their philosophy.
You say potayto, I say patahto.
I love watching 2 people who agree on the facts disagree over what to call it.
Disclaimer: I support Israel's right to exist and I do not hate Jews.
That said, it has been sixty years since the Nazis were defeated and Germany has become a relatively free country. It is high time that the Holocaust stopped being the first thing people think of when they think of Germans or Jews. Jews do not need to maintain a constant state of victimhood and Germans who were not Nazis should not have to bear *ANY* guilt for the actions of people who came before them.
The Holocaust happened and it is over. Move on already. It's getting to where the Holocaust is akin to the issue of slavery in the 1860's: it happened, it's over, move on.
With the world, and Israel, under assualt by Islamofascism I can't say that I'm surprised most Britons don't care about the Holocaust in World War Two. They're more concerned about the Holocaust that might happen next year or next week. Or tomorrow.
Get over it already.
"100% of Britons also unaware of toothpaste"
Bump! (:
Yeah, we should have told the Normandy veterans to get over it already, when we celebrated the 60th anniversary of the D-Day invasions.
It's the teaching of history they are talking about. And judging from the poll, it is desperately needed.
I don't know the details of how the name came about. The male inhabitants and kids were killed. The women were mostly used as sex slaves, the rest were killed. Just remembering the event...
"It's the teaching of history they are talking about. And judging from the poll, it is desperately needed."
I understand what you mean and I can appreciate observing D-Day but there is no need to drill it into daily consciousness the way some people insist the Holocaust must be.
We all need a good education in our history, I agree. But forgive me for saying I'm tired of history being used by special interest groups to forward their present day agendas. Some Jews constantly harp on the Holocaust like it happened yesterday. Jesse Jackasson & Al Sharpton would have us believe slavery is still going on in the South. The Left would have us believe Senator McCarthy still runs Washington.
All of this at the expense of honoring the men who did the fighting and dying to end slavery, stop the Holocaust, and end Communism.
I agree with you, though, and I hope you see this.
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